A rare abstract painting by Bob Dylan (circa 1968) is up for sale, featuring a vibrant abstract composition filled with musical notes, animals, and a prominent central figure of a bull. There is also a red outline of a man in a brimmed hat, reflecting Dylan’s self-image during that era, reminiscent of his “Nashville Skyline” album cover.

“Bob Dylan’s visual art, like his music, draws from a deep well of cultural and personal expression. This painting from his Woodstock years is particularly evocative, capturing the vibrant and transformative spirit of the 60s,” explained Bobby Livingston of RR Auction, which has the work for sale.

More info and images at RR Auction here.

Some big names and a lot of contemporary poster art at the exhibition site, here.

S16 gallery main site, here.

OPERA is a series of crisp, dramatic records of the world’s famous opera houses, all photographed with 4×5” and 8×10” Arca-Swiss cameras to maximize detail. Architecturally meticulous, this body of work serves to historically document these national and cultural landmarks, Leventi says in his artist statement.

The series covers more than 40 opera houses spanning four centuries and four continents, and is presented in a volume entitled Opera, published by Damiani with a foreword by Placido Domingo.

Leventi’s grandfather was a cantor, interned in the Soviet Union

“These are the spaces in which my grandfather, Anton Gutman, never got the chance to perform,” Leventi says. “Gutman was a cantor trained right after World War II by Helge Rosvaenge, a famous Danish operatic tenor who sang regularly with the State Operas in Berlin and Vienna. While Gutman was interned in a prisoner-of-war camp in the Soviet Union, he performed for prisoners and officers. Nearly a half-century later, I grew up listening to him sing while he walked around our living room. As the son of two architects, I experience an almost religious feeling walking into a grand space such as an opera house.”

Leventi’s work also includes curtains from opera houses and other theatres.

Leventi’s photography is included in prestigious private and public collections including The Sir Elton John Collection and The Cleveland Museum of Art.

Leventi, based in the U.S., is a featured artist at Toronto’s Bau-Xi Photo Gallery

See many more opera houses at David Leventi’s artist page, Bau-Xi Photo Gallery, here.

David Leventi’s website, here.

Image at Top of Post: Drottningholm Palace Theatre, Stockholm, fujicolor crystal archive print mounted to dibond. 40 x 50 in.

The Legends Series by Barrie Wentzell, shot in the decade spanning 1965 – 1975, straddled  one of the most important decades in the history of popular music and social change. (Above – Led Zeppelin, 1970)

The exhibition, on through June 17 at Howard495 gallery in Vancouver, brings together 100 of the renowned photographer’s most notable portraits documenting a cultural revolution.

“Rock and Roll acted as a catalyst in mitigating racial discrimination and segregation, it heralded in the second wave of feminism, denounced the Vietnam war and celebrated peace and love,” notes for the exhibition say. “Barrie Wentzell’s work recognizes this and pays homage to the cultural impact of rock and roll and the birth of a progressive society.”

“We were out there discovering bands,” Wentzell says of the days when he worked as chief photographer for Melody Maker, an influential British music magazine that predated Rolling Stone. “Nobody was really famous, apart from the Beatles, and even they were very sweet,” he says in an interview with Galleries West magazine.

Wentzell spent music’s most important decades, 1965 to 1975, as chief photographer for UK music publication, The Melody Maker. Born in England, he now lives and works in Toronto.

See all the images in the exhibition on the Howard495 gallery website, here.

Barrie Wentzell’s website, here.